Have you ever noticed how some tasks energize you while others drain you? The secret lies in your unique strengths. More and more organizations now recognize that true value comes from leveraging individual talents, not enforcing a one-size-fits-all approach.

What makes you irreplaceable? How can your distinctive strengths drive your team’s success beyond generic job descriptions? By understanding and harnessing your strengths, you’re not just boosting your performance—you’re becoming an indispensable asset to your organization.

Photo by Scott Webb on Unsplash

The power of strengths

Research consistently shows that working towards our strengths leads to greater impact and efficiency. As Peter Drucker, pillar of modern management, pointedly asks in “The Effective Executive”:

What unique contribution can I make to significantly increase organizational performance and results?

This question isn’t about being a jack-of-all-trades, but about leveraging what you do best.

Similarly, the Clifton StrengthsFinder philosophy, developed by Don Clifton, emphasizes:

Your weaknesses will never develop, while your strengths will develop infinitely.

It’s a compelling argument for focusing on what we’re naturally good at. But here’s the challenge – many of us are wandering around in a fog when it comes to identifying our strengths. And even if we do stumble upon them, we’re often at a loss for how to put them to good use.

Discovering your strengths

So, how do we cut through this fog? One straightforward approach is to take the StrengthsFinder assessment. While the full 34-strength profile offers deep insights, starting with your top five can be a solid start. There are other excellent tools available such as StrengthScope – I’m recommending StrengthsFinder as I find it the most accessible starting point.

For example, my top five strengths are:

1. Input: You have a craving to know more and collect and archive all kinds of information.
2. Intellection: You are characterized by your intellectual activity and your love for musing and reflection.
3. Relator: You enjoy close relationships with others and find deep satisfaction in working hard with friends to achieve a goal.
4. Learner: You have a great desire to learn and want to continuously improve, excited by the process of learning rather than the outcome.
5. Strategic: You create alternative ways to proceed and can quickly spot relevant patterns and issues when facing any given scenario.

You can pull some basic information from these, especially if you dig into the description of each of the strengths. These strengths span both the strategic and execution domains. However, if I was presented with these strengths and told to do something with them, I’d be at a loss.

Applying your strengths

As noted, just knowing your strengths isn’t enough. You need to know how to apply them. Here are a few strategies I’ve found helpful:

Collaborate with a trusted colleague

Work through your top five strengths with someone who knows you well professionally. When they can say, “I’ve seen you use this strength by doing XYZ,” it illustrates how you’re already applying your strengths in real-world scenarios.

While working through the results with AI is a logical step, there’s a deeper value to the discussion with a real person.

Use AI to summarize and discuss

I fed Claude (I’m currently testing Claude, any other AI assistant would work well) my strengths and asked for a summary. Here’s a chunk of it:

Taken together, these strengths paint a picture of someone who is constantly absorbing new information (Input), thinking deeply about it (Intellection), enjoying the process of learning (Learner), and then strategically applying that knowledge (Strategic). Your Relator strength suggests that you don’t keep this knowledge to yourself – you enjoy sharing it with others and helping them grow too.

Your strength profile emphasizes a remarkable synergy between your love of learning, your natural curiosity, and your inclination to share knowledge. You’re not just a passive recipient of information; you’re an active seeker, a deep thinker, and a generous sharer of insights. This combination of strengths likely makes you a valuable asset in any team or organization, particularly in roles that require continuous learning, strategic thinking, and the ability to convey complex ideas to others.

Okay, that is already so much more applicable than the bare, basic strengths. This tells me about the interplay between them, that I need to constantly be learning, connecting the dots, and sharing my insights with others.

You can build on this conversation further with prompts such as:

• How might my top 5 strengths [list them] work together synergistically? Can you provide specific examples?
• Given my strengths of [list strengths], what potential career paths or roles might be particularly well-suited for me that I may not have considered?
• What are some potential blind spots or challenges I might face given my strength profile of [list strengths]?
• How might I use my strengths of [list strengths] to overcome [specific challenge or goal]?
• Based on my strengths [list strengths], what unique value proposition could I offer to potential employers or clients?
• Can you suggest some specific ways I could develop or enhance each of my top 5 strengths [list them]?

Leverage AI for insights

Artificial Intelligence can offer fresh perspectives on how you are using your strengths.

For instance, I asked Claude to analyze how I used my top five strengths in the thinking which resulted in the blog post about side quests. The insights were eye-opening and helped me appreciate how my strengths shape my work.

Excellent question! Let’s analyze how your top 5 CliftonStrengths themes are reflected in the thinking behind your blog post:

1. Input: Your Input strength is clearly demonstrated in how you’ve gathered and synthesized various ideas and experiences. You’ve taken input from your career considerations, gaming concepts, and a colleague’s insight to create a unique perspective on career decision-making.
2. Intellection: This strength is evident in your deep reflection on your career path and the mental processing you’ve done to reframe your situation. The blog post itself is a product of your introspection and intellectual curiosity about career development.
3. Relator: While less obvious, your Relator strength might be at play in how you’ve shared a personal experience and insight, making the concept relatable to your readers. You’re building a connection with your audience by sharing your own journey.
4. Learner: Your Learner strength shines through in your openness to new perspectives and your enthusiasm for the “side quest” concept. You’re essentially advocating for a learning-oriented approach to career development, encouraging readers to see each opportunity as a chance to learn and grow.
5. Strategic: Your Strategic strength is apparent in how you’ve taken a complex situation (career indecision) and found a simple, effective framework (side quests) to approach it. You’ve created a strategy for viewing career opportunities in a more positive and productive light.

In essence, this blog post is a perfect example of how you’ve applied your strengths:

• You’ve collected information and ideas (Input)
• Reflected deeply on them (Intellection)
• Framed them in a relatable way (Relator)
• Emphasized the learning opportunity in each career move (Learner)
• And provided a strategic framework for approaching career decisions (Strategic)

Your strengths have allowed you to turn a personal challenge into an insightful piece that can help others reframe their own career journeys. Would you like to explore how to explicitly mention or leverage these strengths further in your post?

Use AI to connect strengths to job roles

AI can also help you understand what you’d bring to a specific role. A colleague was struggling to articulate why they’d be a good fit for a job opening. They gave ChatGPT the job description and their strengths, and the AI was able to draw connections between their strengths and the needs of the role – this helped them make a stronger case for the role.

Here are a handful of prompts for inspiration:

• Here’s a job description: [paste job description]. And here are my top 5 strengths: [list strengths]. How do my strengths align with the requirements and responsibilities of this role?
• Given this job posting: [paste job posting] and my strength profile: [list strengths], what unique value could I bring to this position that others might not?
• I’m interested in this job: [paste job details]. My key strengths are [list strengths]. Can you help me draft 3-5 talking points for an interview that demonstrate how my strengths make me an ideal candidate?
• Based on this job listing: [paste listing] and my strengths of [list strengths], what specific examples from my past experiences might demonstrate how I’ve used these strengths in ways relevant to this role?
• Given this job description: [paste description] and my strengths [list strengths], what are some innovative ways I could apply my strengths to excel in this role that the employer might not have considered?

Putting it all together

Understanding and leveraging your strengths isn’t just about personal satisfaction – it’s about maximizing your potential and your contribution to your organization. By focusing on what you do best, you’re more likely to find flow in your work, achieve better results, and feel more fulfilled in your career.

So, I challenge you. Take some time to identify your strengths. Reflect on how you’re currently using them. And then, get creative about how you can apply them even more effectively in your work.

Remember, your strengths are your superpowers. It’s time to unleash them and see where they can take you.